


God Does Not Grant Us Ghosts

by lafiametta



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Ending, F/M, Fix-It, Harry Lives!, Romance, The Other Members of the Crew... Not So Much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-05-21 05:40:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14909417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lafiametta/pseuds/lafiametta
Summary: Harry Goodsir was alive – impossibly, miraculously, alive – the only Englishman who knew the truth of what happened to the Franklin Expedition. He had to go back – to tell the tale, to return to his home and reunite with his family – and yet as each day passed he found his resolve weakening. For how could he possibly bring himself to leave her, the woman who found him and brought him back to life?A gift for @the-terror-amc as part of the Tumblr Terror Fanworks Exchange!





	God Does Not Grant Us Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> In the final episode, Hickey justifies himself by saying that if Goodsir had simply wanted to die, "he could have run out into the hills and starved," and so I began to wonder how the story might have gone differently if he had done exactly that. My recipient also asked for a "Goodsir and Silna hurt/comfort" or a "Goodsir goes off to live with Silna with a happy ending" story, so I decided to combine the two prompts!

Harry Goodsir did not exist.

He was nothing but a shade, a revenant, destined to wander until there was as little left of his body as there was of his spirit.

It had not been very hard to slip away, not with all of them so occupied with the consumption of their supper, and he knew they would not come looking for him for quite some time, at least not until there was another meal in need of serving. And that was a prospect he could not bear to contemplate.

Better to disappear entirely than to lose whatever yet remained of him.

It was the ring that had made the decision for him – David Young’s ring, which he had thought long since buried with the boy these two years past. But it had come back to him, reminding him of the promise he had made, of the man he had once been, and with it the realization that he could no longer go on as he was, both prisoner and servant to a murderous fiend.

The landscape was stark and unforgiving as he plodded along the broken shale, heaven and earth melding uniformly into one. He followed no direction, no path, unaware if he was heading north or south, towards the sea or deeper inland. The sun was of little use, as it was more often than not covered by a miasma of fog, which blanketed the sky with a pale and empty haze that seemed only to mirror the listlessness of his own mind. He wondered if he might encounter the creature, only to realize he had not the strength to care.

Time, too, began to unravel. The summer sun never fully set and so he barely slept, giving himself over to fitful rest until light began to emerge across the horizon, and when it was again fully bright enough to see, he would rise and continue his trek, the shuffle of his boots against the rocks the only sound that cut through the unrelenting silence. One by one, the days mixed together until he lost track of them entirely, a _via dolorosa_ with no beginning and no end.

And yet Harry carried on, his joints aching with each step and his belly sharp with pains of unassuaged hunger, determined to meet his Creator in as much of a state of grace as was possible.

He grew steadily weaker and more disoriented – even as an anatomist he understood what each of his symptoms presaged, and it was clear it would not be much longer until the end finally came. Still, he was slightly surprised one morning to find himself unable to fully stand, his legs weaker than a newborn foal, and so he lay back down onto his side, curling his body inward and letting his mind drift into a quiet oblivion while the wind blew a few stray curls against his cheek. He was no longer afraid to die, no longer apprehensive about what might await him on the other side. He would simply let go and surrender to it, and God willing he would be at peace.

These, he believed, would be his final thoughts.

 

* * *

 

The world returned to him in fragmentary parts, a strange mosaic of sensation that his mind could not entirely encompass.

He felt as though he were moving, yet his body itself remained motionless. The sky – now a robin’s egg blue – stretched out wide and cavernous above him, but he no longer felt the pinch of the sharp stones against his back. An unrelentingly loud rasp came from somewhere just below him, dissonant and jarring and familiar all at once. At one point, he thought he saw a human figure walking just ahead, its face turned away in the opposite direction, its identity concealed almost entirely by the sexless bulk of its clothing. Straining to make sense of such things only exhausted him further, and he lapsed in and out of consciousness, unable to make these pieces form any kind of coherent whole.

For a moment, Harry wondered if he was dead. But if he had mind enough to consider that possibility, he thought, it would stand to reason that he was not.

If he was not dead, though, what was he?

 

* * *

 

When he woke again it was to the relief of water falling cool against his tongue. Instinctively, he opened his mouth wider, every part of him calling out for more even as its source seemed content with offering him little more than a slow trickle. His eyes opened slightly, seeing first an upturned hand, drops of water still gleaming on its fingertips. Beyond that, though, was something that strained the limits of his comprehension.

He was looking into the face of Lady Silence.

She had come back. She had somehow – in a manner beyond all reason and understanding – found him.

It had been months since he had seen her last, and yet, here she was, looking exactly the way he had sought to keep her in his memory, for he had thought never to see her again. He would have deemed it a hallucination if not for the way she was rubbing her sleeve against his chin where the some of the water had spilled down past his mouth.

He weakly glanced around him, quickly realizing that he was laying on some kind of sled, his body covered with a large animal fur. So she had not only found him, but had somehow managed to get him onto the sled and dragged him some distance away from where he had finally stopped. A multitude of questions began to form in his mind – _How had she known where he would be? Where were they going? Where had she been all this while? Did she know what had become of the captain and the other men?_ – but he knew there would be time enough for them later. Because he was alive. Because she had reached out and grasped him from the precipice.

She turned and began to rummage through something by her side, and then with a small knife began to cut apart tiny pieces of what appeared to be raw seal meat, which she slowly fed him, pressing each morsel to his lips and watching as he chewed and swallowed each one. It felt strange to Harry to be ministered to in such a way – as if he were nothing but a helpless child – but such feelings of embarrassment were quickly overpowered by an overwhelming sense of gratitude, his eyes seizing with emotion even though his body was incapable of tears.

Like the water, she was careful not to give him too much, stopping when she seemed satisfied that he had had just enough. She took a few bites of meat for herself and put away what remained, and then she reached toward him and with a gentle tug pulled the fur up and over his shoulders.

With a tidal force, Harry felt exhaustion overtake him and he let his eyes fall closed, her face the last thing he saw before he drifted once more into the comfort of sleep.

 

* * *

 

For nearly two days she pulled him across the length of King William Land – at some small cost to what remained of his pride, even as he rationally understood that he was still far too weak to be capable of walking on his own. He slept off and on, the steady beat of her footsteps and the tumble of the stones under the sled lulling him into a drowsy haze.

“ _We go to your people_?” he whispered in broken Inuktitut at one point when they had stopped to rest. She nodded in a vague and slightly noncommittal way, leaving Harry to understand that he would be getting little more than that from her.

On the afternoon of the second day, though, he was given his answer, for after cresting a small hill they then began to make their way into the center of an Esquimaux camp, which seemed to number nearly a dozen fur-covered tents by his rough estimate. After some brief, mostly one-sided conference with a man Harry could only assume was the leader of the group, he was brought into a smaller tent that stood some ways off from the others, and there the two of them stayed while he recuperated.

For all of that time, he remained inside, still wrapped in the fur, as she brought him food and water and watched over him as he slept. She slept too, for sometimes he would watch her in the meagre light of the oil lamp, contemplate the way the flicker of the flames brought the planes of her face into stark relief, how it gleamed ruddy against the darkness of her hair. In her wakeful hours, she would set herself to carving figures, small and ivory-colored like the ones the men had found with her father. He wondered if perhaps she meant to replace the ones that had been lost or if these were for an entirely new and different purpose.

He saw few others, save for a small child that at one point poked its head into the tent and then quickly ran away, spurred perhaps by equal parts curiosity and fear, and for a single visit by the man she had spoken with on the day of their arrival. He was of an uncertain age, but dressed in a handsome sealskin parka and possessed of a clear and firm voice that conveyed the authority of his position. Harry sat up on the sled and tried his best to explain himself and his situation, but it had been many months since he had fully spoken with someone in Inuktitut and even then, his grasp of grammar and tense had been shaky. What he came to understand was that these people knew nothing of what had happened to the captain or the rest of the men, nor of the breakaway group that he had fled from.

Moreover, they would be breaking camp soon, leaving the summer hunting grounds, and at that point they would be parting company with Silna. At first, Harry could make no guess as to whom he was referring, but then the man glanced towards her, sitting unobtrusively on the floor of the tent, her dark eyes reflecting the glow of the lamp light, and then Harry felt his heart begin to still with sudden realization.

_Silna._

He had never liked the name Lady Silence, for at first it seemed merely a mockery of her grief, and then the worst of misnomers, for in their time aboard _Erebus_ he had found her to be very talkative indeed. After Carnival, the sobriquet seemed even more cruel, and he had often found himself wondering if she might ever have told him her true name, so that he would be able to hold it in his mind whenever he thought of her.

To learn it now was nothing short of miraculous.

 

* * *

 

True to his word, the Esquimaux man returned several days later to announce that they were leaving. By then, Harry had gained enough strength to stand and make small forays inside the tent’s small perimeter, so he hazarded a glance outside to see the entire camp being dismantled, furs being pulled from their timber frames and rolled up into small piles along the ground. He looked back inside, realizing that the tent they stood in would also need to be taken down, for it too would be going with the larger group when they left. The thought must have shown on his face, for the man pointed up towards the furs overhead and, clearly remembering Harry’s somewhat limited vocabulary, said one word to him. _Gift_.

He had something else for Harry as well, who was already brimming with gratitude to think that those who had so little would part with goods so dear, and so necessary to their survival.

What Harry had assumed to be just another animal fur folded in the man’s arms was in fact a thick winter parka, soft and warm and constructed as neatly as anything that could be found in a high street shop. It was true that Harry had no coat, dressed only in the shirt and waistcoat he had on when he had fled, and the man must have noticed, for he pressed the parka into Harry’s grasp firmly enough to let him know that he meant him to keep it. His eyes, however, were flinty with warning, enough for Harry to understand that both gifts were not meant as tokens, but as absolute necessities – a means of enduring the harsh and unrelenting nature of this land.

Harry offered his thanks, as trivial as they seemed in comparison to what he had been given, and the man simply nodded, glancing back towards Silna for a moment before he pushed aside the tent flap and walked away.

Soon enough, the noises outside quieted, to be replaced with the sound of sleds slowly being pulled off into the distance. And then there was nothing, only the empty sound of wind whistling against the walls of the tent.

 

* * *

 

With the departure of the Esquimaux, Harry was forced to make a firm assessment of his situation.  

He was strong enough to walk, although he could not yet travel longer distances, not without some period of rest. But his body was healing, not just from the hunger and thirst, but from the ailments that had plagued him for some time before that: the weakened joints, the bleeding gums, the mottled bruises that had spread along his limbs. His mind, too, felt clearer, his thoughts no longer disjointed or weighted by strains of melancholy.

He understood now what he needed to do.

He could not stay here with her, as much as he might wish to – and some part of him truly desired nothing more than to stay, to forget everything he was and the world he once knew, to lose himself in a place where he would never be found – for he had a duty to the captain and to the men of the ships. He had been given his life back; he could not in turn abandon them.  

He put it to her as best he could, and she seemed to understand, for together they struck the tent and loaded the furs onto the sled, and then she turned and began to pull the sled in the direction of the hills they had crossed when they had first come here, with Harry walking only a trifle unsteadily at her side.

 

* * *

 

They walked south for many days, now and then giving Harry moments to stop and ease his body when he felt the need, and for a time it seemed like they would find nothing at all. Perhaps the men had outpaced him, he thought, perhaps the captain had found a quicker way to the river and they were all bound for Fort Resolution in the bellies of the boats they had pulled for so long across the ice and stones.

He soon realized how very wrong he had been.

They came across them one by one, strewn along like the trail of bloody debris left by a wild animal. First a handful of tents, full tins of food left just outside, the men inside dead for who knows how long. Then another group, and then another, as if each one thought they could outrun whatever it was that was pursuing them. The last group was the largest, and still in possession of the boats, and so it must have been in this place that the final remaining men of _Terror_ and _Erebus_ decided to wait out their fate. They must have known they would not make it any further.

He found Lieutenant Little under the open awning of a tent and he could not help but recoil in horror, not understanding what madness and desperation would drive a man to treat himself so.

He and Silna did what they could for them, for while Harry was too weak to dig proper graves and the ground too hard besides, at least they could gather them all under one tent and cover it with stones, hopefully strong enough to keep out the wind and anything else that might seek to disturb them.

But Captain Crozier was not among them.

Silna’s eyes turned towards the west, as if she sensed there was something there still waiting for them, and she began to pull their sled in that direction, Harry’s mind so entirely unravelled by the nature of what he had seen that he could do little but follow her by taking one unthinking step after the other.

After less than a half day’s walk, he understood what had drawn her to this place. Here they found the camp looking just as he had left it all those weeks – or was a lifetime? – ago. But the tents were empty, including his own, his heavy wool coat still draped across the camp bed as if he had just left it there. It was over the rise that they finally found them all, their bodies laying out the open air in a loose pattern around the strangely lifeless form of the creature. He watched as Silna made her way over towards it, feeling the sudden protective urge to stop her in case it was still somehow alive, but he somehow understood not to intervene. She and the creature had formed some kind of connection – he remembered the way she had described it to the captain – and it was clear from the way she kneeled before it and stroked the fur along its neck that she was grieving it in a fashion he could not begin to comprehend.

But just beyond the creature, his wrist cuffed to a chain that fed into its mouth, was the body of Captain Crozier. How he ended up here, in this camp, Harry had no idea, but it pained him more than he could say to imagine his end, surrounded not by his loyal crew, but by these traitorous men.

What was even more terrible was the realization that there was no one else left to find. Harry alone was all that remained of the Franklin Expedition.  

They buried the captain under a cairn of stones, Harry having etched the captain’s name into a rough headstone that he rooted into the ground as deeply as he could. The rest they burned, including the creature, and then they left that place, neither of them looking back as a thick line of smoke began to curl into the western horizon.

 

* * *

 

The days that followed were the most difficult, for Harry felt as if some vital part of him had died along with all the others, nor did he know if he possessed the strength to continue when the rest of them were gone. Why should he live when so many men – good and decent men – would not be coming home to those they loved?

He ate little and spoke even less, and each night when evening came he retreated into his sleeping furs and prayed that when he dreamed he would not see their faces or hear their voices calling out to him in garbled tongues. He followed passively in Silna’s footsteps, never asking her where they were headed, for in the end, what did it matter? There was nowhere else to go, no one else to search for any longer. And if at any point he paused to wonder why it was that she travelled alone, why she did not remain with her own people, he said nothing, so centered he was within his own private suffering.

Slowly enough, the veil of melancholy fell away, for he had come to realize the great responsibility he now bore. He had once made a promise to David Young that he would return his ring and tell his sister what had become of him; did he not, in fact, owe the same to every member of the crew? There was no one else left alive to tell the story of what had happened to the expedition and if he died, the truth of it would die with him. And while that truth was monstrous – and in some ways beggared belief – would it not be better for it to be known, rather than condemn all those who sought answers to an endless purgatory of uncertainty?

He must find a way back to England; there was no other choice.

By now, however, it was early autumn, too late to try to make the journey south, as it was simply a matter of time before the snows began to fall and the land to become impassable. He would have to wait until spring, and only then would he have a chance of making it home.

One night, when they had stopped to rest, he explained his thoughts to Silna, and even through the thickness of the language he was fairly certain that she understood what he had to do. He found it difficult to look her directly in the eye as he spoke of the necessity of returning to England, which he could only ascribe to the shame he felt in having to ask for her assistance, when she had already sacrificed so much for him already. To his surprise, though, she nodded quickly in agreement, as if she had already assumed that he would be remaining with her for some time and his request nothing more than a mere formality.

He thanked her, telling her he would be in her debt for as long as he lived, only to realize that he did not entirely mind the idea of such an obligation, not when it might in some way preserve the connection that had been forged between the two of them.

And so they continued, two solitary figures moving steadily across an unbroken sea of stones.

 

* * *

 

They moved south, no doubt in search of slightly warmer climes, and while Harry did not know precisely where she intended them to finally stop, he trusted her expertise completely.

The land eventually gave way to frozen sea, which caused Harry no end of astonishment, for it seemed to imply that King William Land was not unbroken land at all, but an island, and that he was now gazing upon the prize they had all come here so desperately to find. Strange that so many men had given their lives to discover a body of water that he and Silna were able to walk across in less than an afternoon, as if it were merely another feature of the terrain. His smile was bittersweet with the pride of knowing that the passage had at last been found, even if he were the only Englishman to know of its existence.

Once across the ice, they came to a place just beyond a small inlet, sitting below the crest of a sharp rise where it would stand partially protected from the harshest winds. She stopped and surveyed it with a wide gaze, taking in the proximity to the sea and the subtle elevations of the earth, and then she nodded once at him, a gesture he immediately understood.

Together they erected the frame of the tent, tying the timber pieces together with strands of dried gut, and then covered the structure with caribou furs, making sure to weigh the edges down with stones to keep the cold from seeping in. Inside, it was dark, even with the small lamp that she had brought, but it felt snug and comfortable, and it would keep them safe enough until the worst of the weather came.

He walked towards the edge of the ice-covered inlet and turned back to take it all in, this tiny haven that was to be his home until the spring came. It was a daunting prospect to be sure, yet he found himself strangely excited by it nevertheless. Perhaps it was because he was not alone, and he knew he could rely on her to show him by what means he might survive within this unforgiving place. Perhaps it was because, by her side, he no longer felt afraid.

 

* * *

 

The first concern, of course, was food, as the stores they had brought with them from the Esquimaux camp were rapidly dwindling to naught.

He watched Silna as she dragged the sled far out onto the ice and disappeared from view; she had made it clear that he should not try to follow her, for what reasons he could not entirely fathom – most likely he would be some sort of impediment or distraction – and so he remained with the tent and slept for a time on the pile of furs that was to serve as their bedding.

He woke to the sound of the sled dragging against the rocks and looked outside to see that her efforts had not been in vain. As her cargo she carried the lifeless body of a seal which she deposited on the ground and promptly began to cut down the center of its body. He watched with interest as she worked, recognizing some of the similarities to his own anatomical studies, for she possessed a deft knowledge of its parts and such precise movements could only have been honed from years of practice.

They ate well that night, the meat raw and greasy in their fingers, and there was much left over to spare, a promise that they would not go hungry for some time at least.  

As they sat across from each other, the sky shivering into darkness, Harry thought of the first time he had brought her dinner, how he had clumsily carried his tray into that little storeroom on the orlop. She had been wary of him, and rightly so, for what had he done but failed to save her father and been party to her virtual imprisonment? But now, they were companions at least, perhaps even friends, although the word seemed inadequate to give to someone who had saved his life and come repeatedly to his aid without asking for a single thing in return.

He gave her a soft smile and thanked her, patting along his belly for emphasis. It was not enough, he knew. But it was all he had.

 

* * *

 

The days passed one after the other, falling interchangeably, even as the growing bite of cold served as a warning of the winter that was sure to come upon them soon.

Sometimes, when the weather was clear, he would don his fur parka and make some exploration along the edges of the inlet, studying the landscape and the way the ice had formed in crested waves against the shore. There was little in the way of plant or animal life, to be sure, although by summer, if the ice melted thoroughly enough, there might be specimens from the water for him to examine. It reminded him in some fragmentary way of the rocky coast near Anstruther, for there too he would wander, fully enraptured by the ocean’s natural pageantry. Here or there, it was all one sea, he supposed, the connection unbreakable no matter where he happened to find himself.

Yet there was always much to do during the day, enough to keep his mind and hands occupied, and he was an eager student for the myriad tasks she saw fit to teach him. The seals she brought back from her hunting trips would need to be butchered and carefully skinned, the meat left outside to freeze or dry, the rest of its parts set aside for so many different uses that he had difficulty remembering them all. The intestines were transformed into strands of pliable gut, the fat rendered into oil for their lamp. The skins would be stretched and softened, her tool of choice for that process being her curved hand blade – an _ulu_ , she had once called it. The blades, too, would need to be sharpened to a fine edge, and all manner of household tools produced. She carved bone knives and harpoon heads, all of it with a skill that would set a head to any English craftsman. 

Harry’s initial efforts at replicating her work were clumsy at best, but he persevered, wanting nothing more than to show her his attempts at improvement.

At night, they would lay side by side under their furs, a proximity necessitated by a need for warmth, yet he also found a great comfort in it, knowing she was there just an arm’s reach away. He never sought to touch her – for he cared for her too much to dishonor her in such a manner – and yet sometimes he would wake to find her pressed back against him, the soft nape of her neck so close he might have brushed it with his fingers. It was partially to his shame that he could never bring himself to pull away, but instead he remained motionless, listening to her deep and even breaths until he at last fell asleep again.

One time she cried out in her sleep, her body quaking from the terrors of a nightmare, and Harry stilled, unsure of how to proceed. After a moment, though, he turned onto his side and cautiously reached out towards her, his hand clasping around the round curve of her shoulder. She had touched him once like this, he thought, offering him comfort in a moment of darkness; why should he not do the same? He whispered her name and then he began to gently hum, recalling a song from his childhood, the words long forgotten even as the melody remained. Soon enough, she quieted, but Harry remained awake for some time after that.

 

* * *

 

The snows came at last, putting a temporary end to his wandering along the shore, for now it was cold enough to risk exposure, and, more importantly, his assistance had become necessary in the construction of an ice house. Harry had read about such things from his collection of Arctic memoirs, but he had never seen one, much less watched one in the process of being built.

In the time since they had come to this place, they had begun to utilize an informal language of gestures, and it was through this that she was able to direct him, albeit painstakingly.

With her long bone knife, Silna mapped out the circular perimeter of the house, and then began to cut rectangular blocks of compressed snow from within the circle. He helped her to assemble the walls, moving each block into place according to her instructions, and he watched as she shaved a slope along the top of each row until the sides began to curve inward, almost entirely enclosing her within its dome. The final block she set into place from inside the ice house and then she cut a hole from the side, using the remaining pieces to form a shallow overhang for the entrance.

Once complete, it was nearly invisible against the white void of the landscape, an astonishing camouflage that led him to finally understand how it was that her people had survived in this place for so long whereas his had struggled so mightily. They did not seek to master the landscape, to conquer it entire, but rather they became part of it, and through that submission were able to understand its secrets. It was disquieting to consider what the expedition might have accomplished had they only thought to ask the right questions.

Still, some part of him could not really believe that such a structure could be warmer than the tent, yet he quickly realized the error of his assumptions. Standing inside, with a lamp burning and a fur partially covering the entrance, he found the temperature to be remarkably pleasant. Under the sleeping furs, which she had placed atop a raised bed of snow built into the interior wall, it would be warmer still.

The bed itself was fairly narrow, only slightly larger than his bunk on board _Erebus_ , but he would not let himself consider any further implications of that fact. He would not allow himself to think about what it would be like to lay so close to her, night after night, through the long darkness of the winter.

Instead, Harry set himself to the remaining tasks of the day, hoping to find something particularly laborious, for with his body so occupied there would be less occasion for his mind to wander.

 

* * *

 

The sun began to retreat day by day, until at last it disappeared entirely.

Soon enough it would be the solstice, Harry realized, the shortest day of the year, although without a calendar or any observational equipment he would have difficulty identifying it precisely. Back in England, they would be celebrating Christmas and then the new year, and now he could truly understand why such occasions were so vitally necessary, for in the darkest of part of the winter they brought joy and light, enlivening men's spirits with the hope that the world might be reborn yet again.

One night, as they were eating, he described the winter holidays to her – sidestepping for a moment the thorny theology surrounding Christmas – and told her of their various customs and traditions, all the celebrations shared with family, the singing and the meals, and of course the exchange of gifts.

It was a wistful recollection, and it remained in his thoughts for some time, refusing to be dislodged. And in the days that followed, Harry began to wonder if the two of them might also be in need of some celebration, for they rarely ventured outside the ice house, and having something to look forward to would go far to break apart the monotony of the continuous night.

She smiled as he told her of his plan and nodded in agreement.

There would not be much preparation involved, but Harry nevertheless found himself becoming more and more excited at the thought of their festivities, which he set in ten days’ time, the date he estimated to be the closest to the solstice. Anyone of his previous acquaintance might have considered it slightly heathen to be celebrating the middle of winter rather than the birth of Christ, but here, Harry reasoned, the two of them might do well to fashion their own traditions. It was not for nothing that it was called the new world.

When the night finally arrived, he made her close her eyes as he repositioned the furs so that they could sit together facing the oil lamp, as if it were a blazing hearth in some crofter’s cottage, and there they shared their holiday feast, the meat of a snowy ptarmigan that had come across her path two days before. They ate until their bellies were full and then a little more besides, an indulgence that could only seem at that moment entirely well-earned. Remembering the way his family would join together to sing carols, Harry thought to offer her a demonstration, only to realize that the only one he could recall was “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen,” and of that just the first stanza. She laughed at him a little then, her eyes warm in small glow of the lamp light.

It would not be a celebration without gifts, however, and Harry had prepared something for her, having managed to keep it a secret until now.

He gave it to her wrapped in a small square of seal skin, for it was not very large, and in truth, not much at all. But he had crafted it with his own hands, shaped the piece of stone with a carving blade until it took on the familiar form and polished it until it gleamed bright like a new half-crown. And even if it did not perfectly resemble the rounded body of a seal, for he had made the nose a bit too squat and the eyes too far apart, she did not seem to mind, as she held onto it for some time, running her finger up and down the length of the seal’s stone back as if half-expecting it to come to life.

But Silna had secrets of her own as well. There was a tiny smile set along her mouth as she put down the carved figure and began to dig through a pile of furs, emerging at last with a bundle that she handed over to him. Unfolding it, Harry quickly realized that she had sewn him a pair of sealskin trousers to replace his wool Navy-issue, for these would be far warmer and more waterproof besides. He hardly knew what to say beyond the barest mumblings of gratitude; in comparison to his gift, she had given him something of real and practical value and must have spent countless hours working to complete it. It was undoubtedly one of the finest things he had ever been given.

She looked at him questioningly and patted her hand just above her heart, a gesture he understood at once. _Happy?_ He nodded and smiled, for he was, more than he could even say.  

Their celebration seemed nearly over, yet Harry could not bear to have it end just yet. And so he suggested that they step outside the ice house, for the weather had been clear that day and the stars would already be hanging bright and full across the ink-black sky.

The winter air burned as it entered his lungs, but he had never felt more alive. They could not remain outside for very long, or else bring great risk to themselves from the dangers of the cold, but it was still beautiful to see, the winter constellations proudly arranging themselves like a celestial tableau.

And then along the horizon, a shimmer of color began to appear, forming ghostly lines of verdant green and purple that began to build and shift as they danced across the eastern edge of the sky. He had seen the aurora borealis before, several times from the deck of _Erebus_ , but each time he felt himself wrapped within some beautiful enchantment. It was difficult for Harry to look away, and yet he did, for he turned to look at her, and watched her quietly, her eyes a brilliant reflection of the sky’s otherworldly color. She caught his gaze and held it, and for a moment Harry wished that he could hear her speak to him just once more.

He tapped against his heart, asking her the same question she had posed to him inside. Silna nodded once and then took a step towards him, close enough that she could loop her arm through his and gently rest her head against his shoulder.

Harry took one more icy breath, knowing that they needed to go back inside even as he found himself entirely unable to move. In truth, he had no wish to be anywhere else but here in this wild, unknown place, standing here with her, feeling the warmth of her pressed against him through the thick fur of their parkas. Yet he could not stay, and he would have to leave eventually, when the spring came, when it was time for him to begin to make his way back home.

 _But what if he was already home?_ a part of his mind cried out. _What if this is what he had come so far to find?_

He did not know how to answer these questions, not entirely, nor did he know how to make sense of what he felt for Silna. Such feelings and sentiments were purely elemental, defying explanation. But the idea of losing her, of having her with him only as a pale and distant memory, pained him more than he thought possible. He could live without her, he supposed, but perhaps he did not want to at all.

Still, he told himself, there were the other men of the expedition and the duty he owed them to proclaim the truth of what had happened here. But what was that truth? That they had been hunted by a preternatural creature? That good Englishmen had turned on each other and descended not only into barbarism and even the most unthinkable of practices? He realized that no one would believe him; he would be deemed a fabulist or else the worst of malcontents. And if he did not return, if he let it remain a mystery, the men of _Erebus_ and _Terror_ would remain forever good and true, their memories left unsullied.

And what of him? He would stay here with her and never go back?

Did she even want him to stay?

He turned towards her, making certain he had caught her gaze, and then pointed sharply to himself.

“Harry,” he said, and then laid his palm flat parallel to the ground. _Stay._ He repeated his name once more and then said hers, clasping both of his hands together to show how they were linked, and then again laid his hand flat towards the earth. _Stay._ He brushed his hand away, extending it out towards some unknown point. _Forever_.

And then he stood, feet rooted into the frozen ground equally by hope and fear, as he looked at her imploringly and waited for her reply.

Her mouth turned upwards into the shyest of smiles as she laid one mitten-covered hand against his chest. The other she swept out towards the distant stars, her gesture an unmistakable echo of his own.

He no longer felt the cold. No matter that it was the darkest day of the year, and that he had not seen the sun for many weeks. There was nothing else to concern him at this moment, nothing but the woman next to him, the woman who had brought him back from the precipice and taught him how to live once more. Hearing his breath pause in the crystalline hush of the air, he leaned closer, and softly pressed his lips to hers.

 

* * *

Harry Goodsir did not exist.

He was neither shade nor revenant, but a man of flesh and blood, with eyes that saw and a heart that beat, and a name that was known only to her.


End file.
